Psychonautics: A Comic’s Exploration Of Psychedelics

Taking all these pills, tablets, herbs, and fungi means Mauss does end up in a psychiatric hospital for about one week. During his break from reality, he believes that aliens were talking to him and their voices won’t stop talking. His brain was processing so much that he was overwhelmed and that is what ultimately led to the break. This told via a fun animated sequence to highlight just how much information he believes he was receiving.

Aside from Mauss, director Brian Bellinkoff interviews experts about potential benefits of the numerous drugs Mauss tries. Cole J. Marta is a psychiatrist and psychedelic researcher who discusses how various legal treatments have been clinically proven to help their patients. James Fadiman is a psychologist that explains how the drugs help and hurt the brain. Some of these psychedelics remove barriers that the brain develops over time. A few walls are to block out traumatic events; others just come with age. All the experts agree that the United States government’s “war on drugs” (exclusively aimed to keep down specific groups of people) allowed research into potential uses for patients and therapy to be set back by decades.

“…all these pills, tablets, herbs, and fungi means Mauss does end up in a psychiatric hospital…”

Psychonautics: A Comic’s Exploration Of Psychedelics also has former roommates and other stand-up comedians on the record. They gave background information on Mauss and where he is at in his career. Dave Waite used to live with him, as they both started off in the comedy scene. Waite believes that Mauss was also ahead of the curve. Zach Sherwin was ecstatic to see Mauss laughing, hard, at his set. Actress Heather Matarazzo is an activist for the good these things can do, and she lends credible stories, from a patient’s point of view.

Based the switching of styles between talking head and animation, the wealth of knowledge presented, and its humorous lead, Psychonautics: A Comic’s Exploration Of Psychedelics should be much more engaging than it winds up being. All the ingredients are there, but it fails to compel the audience into caring. Are the USA’s drug laws way too harsh? Yes. Do the political motivations that created them (and keep them in place) frustrate those who wish to harness psychedelics for good? Absolutely.